


Morbid Entertainment

by Shurely



Category: Darkest Dungeon (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, Exploration of the Courtyard, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:28:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 16,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26164138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shurely/pseuds/Shurely
Summary: The gates to the Courtyard have opened, loosing its curse upon the Hamlet. The Baron's invitation cannot be ignored. The chips are in, and the games have begun.
Relationships: Crusader/Highwayman (Darkest Dungeon), Dismas/Reynauld (Darkest Dungeon), Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 30





	1. Chapter 1

The tolling bell — two thunderous strikes, the second delayed long enough for the first to ring fully and the sound to reach the Hamlet — heralded the return of the party. The musketeer, Quiet, knocked the tilt of her hat back with her knuckle, staring down the four mercenaries from her perch at the scouting post to confirm she hadn’t miscounted. She had missed once before. She wouldn’t again. Not when the Hamlet’s hopes were riding on her.

Doors burst open across the Hamlet’s buildings. From the abbey came the vestals, joining with the doctors from the sanitarium, both holding their respective books of study and implements of healing.

There were quick flashes of discussion between them: reassurances and affirmations in varying tones of nervousness. Junia flanked Paracelsus. Neither said a word, their eyes on the road leading to the Hamlet town square. Their colleagues, honed to the growing tension, soon fell silent as well.

The other footsteps of their friends in the Hamlet more than compensated for their reticence. Patrons of the tavern left in semi-drunken hazes or peered out their windows. Armour rattled and trinkets clattered on belts. The Hamlet’s citizens flocked to the town square, pausing in their training or their construction or their research. 

The outskirts of the Hamlet were shadowed by the figures of the lepers, the abominations, the outsiders whose usual vigil had been punctuated with a gnawing dread for the last week. Baldwin, wrapped in his soft cotton hood and cloak, took his sword down the hill to the square, hefting its weight along with the weight of foreboding on his chest. He saw the crusader sprinting out from the abbey, armourless, weaponless, and wondered how desperate he was to have forgone the instruments of mercy at his disposal.

Reynauld ran down the road, having shrugged off the houndmaster William’s cautionary hand, blood throbbing in his ears, his breath hot and abrasive. He had heard the bell, knew what it meant — but he had to see with his own eyes, he _had_ to. Pont’s craving screams still echoed in his head and to hear the same thirsting torment from Dismas was a possibility he couldn’t bear.

If he ran fast enough, he could save Dismas from that thirst. He had enough in his veins — the adrenaline-fuelled flush in his body assured him of that — and to spare him the madness of bloodlust would be enough.

He saw the four mercenaries hiking the last stretch of the road and screamed, “Dismas!”

Barristan, Quièvremont, Mortmain, and Dismas had their eyes on him as he closed the gap between them and feverishly scrutinised them for evidence of their success or failure.

Quièvremont’s red robes were no indication of the outcome; they were dyed from his flagellation long before he arrived at the Hamlet. Barristan’s shoulders were always slumped — from the wars, so he claimed, the years taking its toll, and not the despair that sometimes took over the Hamlet’s mercenaries. Mortmain’s arm brushed against Dismas’. She raised a hand in greeting, the same gesture as her invocation to the Light for mercy. And Dismas—

Reynauld took in all the scuffs and scrapes across Dismas’ clothes, his fear only deepening as he drew closer and saw how severe some were. And then his arms were around Dismas’ waist, pulling him into his embrace, tucking his head into his shoulder to let Dismas feel the beat of his blood and take as he needed.

He waited for the sting on his skin, or perhaps the weakness would come first, or perhaps a sound of gratitude or misery or mocking from Dismas, all of which were likely outcomes. In the split second of Dismas’ breath leaving his lungs under Reynauld’s grip, Reynauld relished the relief of Dismas alive and whole, no matter what affliction he had returned with.

Dismas patted his back. “Down, boy,” he exclaimed, and Reynauld heard the smile in his voice. He waited, giving Dismas once last chance to bite, and then pulled back, only for Dismas to lean forwards and press their heads together.

He smelled Dismas’ breath. It was stale and bloodless. The weight in his gut vanished with such abrupt clemency, he almost buckled.

“I could have the plague,” said Dismas lightly, and reclined back enough to meet Reynauld’s eyes, his own the familiar mottled blue.

Reynauld swallowed. “I know.”

“Or the runs. Light above, do you remember the cistern after the trip into the Warrens—”

Reynauld slotted his lips over Dismas’ and pushed himself into the kiss, hands squeezing Dismas’ sides before running up his navel and chest to the chiselled planes of his cheeks. Dismas matched his fervour with a seldom-voiced yet oft-expressed sincerity. Their kiss ran deep long enough for Reynauld to break for breath, Dismas gasping and beating at Reynauld’s shoulder.

“Shit, love, give me a damn second to actually get back to the Hamlet before you eat my face off.” He scowled, but his hands were still on Reynauld, so Reynauld was content.

“Seconded.” Reynauld looked over to Quièvremont, who opened his arms. “You can eat _my_ face off all you want when I’ve cleaned up. How does that sound?”

“I want a bath,” complained Mortmain, shaking her head and picking up the pace to the Hamlet. Barristan nodded his acknowledgement to Reynauld, who nodded back, and walked by Mortmain’s side. “If you want to kiss and cuddle out here, be my guest. But I’m going back for a nice, hot bath, a plush cushion to rest my feet, and a rose-scented candle by which I shall read my verses, because fuck you, Dismas, you wouldn’t shut up about them.”

Dismas barked a laugh. “That’s if the folks ain’t burned them in preparation for our funerals.”

“Does my eye deceive me—” Barristan squinted into the distance, and Reynauld caught Dismas’ flat glare to know he was sick of the joke “—or has the whole Hamlet come out to meet us?”

Reynauld followed Barristan’s gaze to the crowd of people at the mouth of the Hamlet, weapons glinting in the shaft of summer sunlight, standing guard and waiting for the five of them to return.

“They’ve come out to see if I’ve developed the same curse as Pont,” said Quièvremont dryly, unfazed by the morbid truth. “More’s the pity I’m curseless. I could have been given a rose-scented candle for free.”

“Dismas,” said Reynauld, and Dismas blinked innocently. He hooked their hands together and followed after Quièvremont, Mortmain, and Barristan. “Did you promise away all of our candles?”

“A slanderous accusation, love! I was only promoting my side business. We had to fill the time _somehow_ whilst we trekked through the Baron’s Courtyard.”

“With enterprising?” said Reynauld incredulously, and turned to Mortmain to share her look of sympathy.

“He really wouldn’t shut up. Rose, amber, lily. What does amber even smell like?”

She threw up her hands in exasperation, jostling the laden haversack on her back. It clinked and rattled. A familiar twitch in Reynauld’s hands was stifled by Dismas’ grasp; he gave Reynauld an understanding look, and then bowed his head forwards to offer a view of his own haversack, slack on his shoulders.

“Not much in the way of conventional treasures in the Courtyard,” he said. Reynauld saw a nasty gash at the back of his head and pursed his lips. Dismas continued, “But there was a nice set of dice for Sarmenti on one of the chevalier’s coats.”

“There were knights?” said Reynauld.

For a moment, he imagined the bulk of his armour stuffed with the same raving madness as had possessed Pont, and shuddered. If _he_ had been the one to go to the Courtyard, would Dismas have greeted him with the same compassion?

 _He would have known better_ , Reynauld thought immediately.

Dismas nudged him, and he looked down to see his grin. “Absolutely. Real charmers. Tall and handsome. Strong and silent.”

“Mandibles to die for,” said Quièvremont over his shoulder. Over the knotted scars of his flagellation gleamed three new, serrated tears, crusted over in facets of red and yellow.

“No one tell him about the courtesans,” added Mortmain, and Reynauld groaned.

“You didn’t promise your candles to _them_ , too?” he complained, and Dismas protested, “Enterprise, Rey!” as they neared the first bastion of vestals and doctors before the Hamlet.

Reynauld stood to the side, giving space to Junia and Paracelsus’ superficial assessments of the mercenaries’ health. Paracelsus clicked her tongue at Reynauld for his recklessness, but the excited murmuring of the other doctors over Quièvremont’s injuries drew her attention from a scolding. The vestals murmured and cajoled their sister, who smiled with tears in her eyes as they beckoned her to the abbey to be cleansed.

Barristan was almost bowled over by Fi, the houndmaster William’s companion, once the Hamlet’s welcoming party had sanctioned them to proceed. William hailed Barristan, letting Barristan pet and coo over Fi before he called her back.

Most civilians, however, kept their distance as the doctors formed an escort around the mercenaries. If Quièvremont was disheartened by their increased wariness of him, he hid it well with his bold tales of blood and rapture in the Courtyard to the fascinated doctors.

Standing by the fountain was the heir, the estate’s caretaker at her heel. She smiled warmly at the mercenaries.

“It’s good to see you all return,” she said, and the people quietened. Barristan raised his hand in a salute, and she inclined her head towards him. “What news of the Courtyard?”

“The Baron is still alive.” Mortmain held her chin high. The other mercenaries stood with her. The Hamlet’s citizens whispered to one another. “We ran out of supplies and had to retreat. But we made a map of what we explored of the Courtyard, and we bring guides and explanations on how to fight the bloodsuckers and its obstacles.”

“And none of you contracted the Crimson Curse?”

Reynauld met Dismas’ eyes. The corner of his mouth quirked: a flash of triumph and reassurance to Reynauld. Everyone else waited, hinging on the uncertainty of the next words from Mortmain.

“None of us have exhibited the symptoms, Your Ladyship.”

“Then I am all the happier for your return, and I will see to it your reports will be examined as your needs are fulfilled. In the meantime, I trust our physicians and clerics to keep everyone safe and check for the curse.”

The heir gestured for the vestals and doctors to resume their quarantine, and they ushered the mercenaries towards the sanitarium.

“Tell the barkeep to prepare his finest,” called Dismas before he was hustled inside. “I expect a round on the table when I’m out! And none of that Eighty-Seven swill!”

Reynauld prepared a retort, but the doors were already closed, and a sigh of relief swept through the crowd in a combined rush of air strong enough to tickle the hairs on his nape. He took the steps down from the sanitarium and met Baldwin, who rested on his sword.

His eyes, dark and scathing, stared at him from the cradle of cloth over his mouth and nose. Reynauld recognised the accusation, a mirror to the guilt that had begun to fester in him. If Dismas, or any of the mercenaries, had been cursed, Reynauld might have caught it, succumbed to it, spread it.

But Reynauld glanced over to Sarmenti, who spoke enthusiastically with a vestal who was holding Mortmain’s haversack, and the reluctant slide of Baldwin’s gaze when Reynauld looked back showed his own understanding.

Would _he_ have not done the same for Sarmenti, their morbidly entertaining jester, who had twined and fastened Jingles’ story into the annals of history? And would not Reynauld have brought his sword then, for the same gesture of coup de grâce for which Baldwin had prepared?

Baldwin turned on his heel and headed back to the camps on the outskirts of the Hamlet. Sarmenti broke off his conversation to catch up with him, and the exclamations of his joy in the party’s return were echoed by the other citizens.

Reynauld stayed for a minute, sending a prayer to the Light for its kindness and its grace, for not only the party’s return but their apparent good health. And as he vowed to see the Baron’s end and the fall of the bloodsuckers, he slapped a mosquito against his neck and headed towards the tavern to fulfil Dismas’ request.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Candlemaker Dismas inspired by MnM_ov_doom's wonderful [fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11541261) and the Highwayman affliction lines!
> 
> Come visit my [tumblr](http://samiltonbattmann.tumblr.com/)!


	2. Chapter 2

Dismas pressed the back of his hand against Mortmain’s forehead. She stared at his midsection with glazed eyes. Her skin scalded his hand.

“It’s my fault,” said Barristan. As he unwound a roll of bandages, his tongue darted out to the corner of his mouth, where the long gash across his face bled down his cheek. Then he saw Dismas staring, and he held a dressing in place whilst he bandaged it to the cut. “I should have had my shield up.”

Dismas stepped away from Mortmain, who cleaned her hands on her habit and then took up her mace again. The night in the Courtyard had passed with Dismas keeping watch and only the waking company of the mosquitoes. Mortmain and Barristan’s puncture wounds from the day before were swollen purple in the morning. The falling sensation in Dismas’ gut — horror, resignation, despair — had almost winded him when Barristan had reached for the blood vials they kept in their haversacks.

Mortmain had said nothing that morning. Dismas said nothing now, scanning over the hedgerows and down the paved garden paths for a sign of where they should go next. Quièvremont recovered a small perfume bottle from one of the courtesan corpses, except its liquid was a semi-congealed claret. He stowed it away in his haversack in a clumsy sleight of hand.

But Mortmain was praying to the Light, and Barristan’s eye was closed as he paid obeisance to the healing she bestowed. Dismas was the only one to notice, and he let it slide as he took the lead with Quièvremont.

“We’re moving away from the river,” remarked Quièvremont, swatting the flies and mosquitoes away from his face. Some clung to his robes. “I think we’re almost at the heart of this infernal garden. You heard laughter and cheering last night?”

“Close by,” affirmed Dismas. He looked over his shoulder; Mortmain and Barristan were following. Mortmain offered him a strained smile. He nodded at her and then turned back to face the path. “The Baron has to be around here.”

“If we need another key to find him, I’ll wrench the gate bars open myself.”

Dismas glanced at him, wary of the vehemence in his voice. But it was born from frustration, not bloodlust. Not yet, anyway. “And I’ll help.”

They stalked down through the Courtyard, Dismas attuned to the slightest rustle or scrape around them. He and Quièvremont held back Mortmain and Barristan as a scuttling, chittering behemoth of a bloodsucker crawled out from the hedgerows in front of them and passed by, none the wiser.

Cloaked figures, hands scaled with chitin, watched them from the shade of their hoods, only the red glint of their eyes betraying their rapt attention. Dismas passed out rations between the party, and fought the urge not to snatch his hand back when Mortmain and Barristan lingered too long on his outstretched arm.

Mortmain kept pushing the heels of her palms into her eyes, groaning to herself. Barristan’s breathing wheezed with concentrated effort. They staggered together, footfalls becoming less co-ordinated with each step.

Dismas’ skin crawled with the thought of them behind him. But it was still Mortmain and Barristan: the same indefatigable vestal and man-at-arms. They’d done this before. Amani had returned from the Cove with the Crimson Curse, her party ambushed by bloodsuckers, and she had joined the newly-installed quarantine in the Hamlet. Mortmain and Barristan would be safe in the quarantine when they returned.

“Light take us,” he heard Mortmain moan, and would have turned to reassure her had Quièvremont not cackled and swung his scourge.

Instead, he snapped back to attention where Quièvremont’s strike lacerated the long, fanged maw of a crocodilian monster. Its teeth chomped on empty air, Quièvremont diving away just in time. Dismas pulled out his dirk as it landed heavily in the spot Quièvremont had just stood in; it rumbled in anger, and from the hollow hive of its back echoed the buzz of flies that had bred and thrived on its flesh.

Then a hand landed on Dismas’ left shoulder, and he whirled round to slice through skin. He recognised steel plate, however, and in the split second of coming to terms with Barristan’s proximity and his humid breaths and the nails biting through his coat, Barristan pulled him back.

“Behind my shield,” he rasped, when his voice should have been a roar. Dismas saw the quake of his hands and did not argue.

The crocodilian lunged towards Quièvremont again, being the closest target, and Barristan bashed into its snout with his shield. Blood sprayed as teeth scattered across the pavement.

Dismas’ flintlock went wide as Mortmain charged past him. “Mortmain, no!” he cried.

But her reply was shrill and gargled, mace raised high, and the crocodilian leapt up with its jaws open to meet her.

Dismas flinched in a full body shudder as its teeth sank into her shoulder, a swarm of flies jostled out and clouding the air around the two of them. Mortmain screamed. Her mace connected with its chest. Her other hand raked its right eye. Her habit bloomed with blood.

He aimed again, this time at the gouged socket. Mortmain’s head bobbed into shot for a moment, before she was tossed aside and the crocodilian scampered towards him and Barristan. Quièvremont caught Mortmain, whose bloody hand was already raised, the red turning into white as it was eclipsed in healing light. Her shriek was ecstatic.

Then the crocodilian threw its weight against Barristan, jaws snapping above his shield, and Barristan howled with broken euphoria.

“Come forth, beast! Bleed for me!”

He fought against the crocodilian, both hands supporting the shield, and Dismas swerved around his other side. For a moment, he could see its full, mutated length as it thrashed and gnashed.

Then it dropped to the ground and noticed him, unshielded and alone, and lunged, and he pulled the trigger.

The legs went limp and it slumped. Everyone panted and gasped. Dismas whipped around, scouting the nearby vicinity for any more bloodsuckers, his flintlock still steadied, his dirk held close to his chest.

But he only saw the shimmering hedgerows agitated by the breeze, the flies hovering over the crocodilian’s corpse, and Barristan and Mortmain racing for it.

He dove for Barristan and just managed to hook his arms around Barristan’s waist to twist him aside. Barristan stumbled and together they tripped, Dismas instinctively tucking in to land on his elbow and roll onto his side whilst Barristan crashed in a clatter of metal plate.

“I know what I need!” Dismas jumped to his feet, dirk and flintlock poised. Barristan clambered to his knees. His eye was bloodshot, chin glimmering wet. He didn’t bother to pick up his shield or morningstar. “Just give me a taste!” he pleaded, his gruff voice strung into a high-pitched whine.

Dismas fought down the nausea that rose in his throat. He backed up towards the crocodilian’s corpse. Behind him, Mortmain’s grunts told him Quièvremont was facing his own struggle.

“I’m so thirsty, _please_ , it’s only a small bit, it won’t hurt!”

Even when mortally wounded, Mortmain had always gritted her teeth and shouldered her pain in silence. He dared to glance over his shoulder, and was wrenched between pity and horror at the tears tracking down her face. Quièvremont had one arm around her, the other holding her book of verses.

From the edge of his hood, Dismas saw Quièvremont’s grin.

“You don’t fancy the taste of crocodile, Dismas?” he called.

Dismas wrinkled his nose. He sheathed his weapons to unsling his haversack from his shoulders and take out a vial of blood: the synthesised brew concocted by the doctors, enough to slake the afflicted’s thirst to bring them to sanity, but no more than that.

“You said we were far from the river,” he snapped as he held out the vial to Barristan. Barristan swooped and seized it from his hand, and whilst he whimpered as he downed his share, Dismas brought out another vial and tossed it to Quièvremont, who laughed when Mortmain snatched it out of the air. “Why the fuck was a crocodilian so far inland?”

“Hungry creatures will go to any lengths to feed,” said Quièvremont pointedly as he watched Mortmain, the peek of his eyes from his hood gleaming. Mortmain paused for a moment, wiped her mouth on her sleeve, and stuck her middle finger up at him. He wiped his own mouth as if in empathy. There was only a faint meniscus of blood left in the vial.

“You have no idea,” whispered Mortmain. She struggled with her haversack’s clasp as her hands trembled, but managed to stow away the empty vial for the doctors to reuse.

Dismas checked to see how Barristan fared, and eased slightly as Barristan picked up his morningstar and shield. His beard dripped crimson.

“It’s like being reborn,” he said reverently, and Mortmain hummed, low and longing.

“A sweet nectar,” she sighed.

“I can feel it pulsing through me. Dismas—” Barristan leant towards him, and Dismas reared back. Barristan chuckled and straightened his shoulders. “You should taste it, my boy. There is no purity like its silk; it’s a fire that heats with the power of youth.”

“Well, you can wax poetic about it when we’re back in the Hamlet,” said Dismas bitterly. “I’m sure Pont and Amani have a lot to say on the matter and would gladly start a forum with you.”

“It’s…it’s consuming, the thought of it.” Mortmain viciously shook her head. “No, I can’t think about it. Distract me. Where to now?”

Dismas pushed the thought of Barristan crowding over his shoulder, jaw hanging open as he lusted for blood, from his mind, though the gooseflesh pricked on his arms remained. “A little further. Let’s hope no more of those reptile fuckers have come landwards.”

Mortmain looked at him, her eyes bloodshot just like Barristan’s. The red smear across her mouth began to darken as it dried. “To the Baron?”

“We can defeat him, I know it,” declared Barristan, leading the group with sudden vitality. “His defeat shall make the prize all the sweeter for us.”

Quièvremont snickered, and Mortmain paused for a moment, shivered with a look of rapture on her face, and then followed close on his heels. Quièvremont spread his arms at Dismas — consolingly or tauntingly, he couldn’t tell — and Dismas stared them as they led the way.

“Now hold up, old man.” He ran to the front of the party, where Barristan towered over him. Mortmain scowled at him. He saw her hand on her mace tense. “We’ll find out where the Baron’s waiting, but no further. We ain’t got the supplies to deal with him. We’ve no clue how he operates. The Necromancers, the Swines — all of our victories have been earnt through reconnaissance—”

“You’re afraid of failure,” said Barristan. His eye pinned Dismas.

“Like any sane fucking person.”

Mortmain scoffed. “You’re afraid of contracting the Curse.”

“So would you, if you could see what you’ve become!”

Quièvremont smiled, and reached out to pat Dismas’ shoulder. Dismas swerved out of reach. “You have nothing to fear. The Light will keep you safe.”

“We’re stronger like this.” Barristan looked to Mortmain. “How long until we find another invitation to the Courtyard, hmm? How many more must suffer for our delay?”

Dismas gritted his teeth, hand fluttering by his dirk. “You know what the heir said. No more deaths.”

He remembered Reynauld, head tucked towards his chest, curled on his knees whilst the rain pelted him and shimmered off his armour and the headstone. Mowbray — so young, so brilliant with the light of his banners and the shine of admiration in his eyes — had been the first, before Jingles. Barely even a soldier, let alone a knight.

He searched for the same remorse that gnawed at him in Barristan’s, Mortmain’s, and Quièvremont’s eyes. But they glared at him instead, the tapers of their pity and derision burning to the quick. He growled in frustration.

“You’re risking your lives,” he gritted out. “What are you gonna do when you ain’t got no more blood? You think you’re gonna get any better if you drink from the bloodsuckers?”

Barristan opened his mouth to retort, and from the ugly furrow in his mouth, Dismas dreaded it. But Mortmain spoke first. “We’ll find the Baron before then.”

There were two problems with that sentiment: finding the Baron, and then recovering a trophy for Paracelsus and the doctor’s research. Before they had left, she had made it clear: “We need part of the Baron’s oral or jugular tissue. His uvula or tongue.”

Not knowing what a uvula was and being too afraid to ask why it would be in one’s mouth, Dismas had nodded. “The tongue. Shouldn’t be too hard, what with all the bloodsuckers trying to put their mouths to our necks.”

An old instinct reared its head, but Dismas tamped it down. Dread fit him like his old highwayman coat, just as worn-soft and split as the boots he’d fled a hundred miles in. But if Reynauld could fight his urge to steal, Dismas could fight the urge to cut and run.

But with three of his party raving for blood — Light help him if Quièvremont got infected, because his violent penitence was bloody enough and Dismas winced at the thought of him scooping handfuls of his own flagellation to drink — it was only a matter of time before _he_ succumbed, too.

What was he _really_ afraid of? The foul mutations of the bloodsuckers that they might turn into: all mandibles and chitin and probosces, torsos cinched into thoraxes whilst flies hollowed their backs into hives? The reckless need to sate one’s thirst, exhibited by Mortmain and Barristan’s savagery? Or that, with the four of them consumed by bloodlust, they might never make it back to the Hamlet at all — that the Courtyard would trap them with the haze of their own gluttony?

Dismas drew his scarf up higher on his face from where it had slipped to just below his nose. The stench of blood was muddling his head.

“All right.” Satisfaction swept across his friends’ faces, and Quièvremont hefted his scourge onto his shoulder, uncaring of how its tails slapped onto his back. Dismas took a deep breath through his mouth. “Let’s keep going. But when we run out of blood, we leave. We need to make it back to the Hamlet.”

“I’m sure the Baron has plenty to spare,” said Quièvremont.

“Hear, hear, my friend!” Barristan clapped Quièvremont on the shoulder, and then grinned at Dismas. “Take heart, boy. We have survived this Courtyard once. After today, it will be a memory, cold and fading.”

Dismas bit down his reply, taking up his place in the ranks and vowing to himself that no matter what happened, it wouldn’t be _him_ left cold and fading in the hellhole of a Courtyard.


	3. Chapter 3

When the scouts’ bell rang twice, Reynauld whipped his head round, staring out the window to where the view of the Old Road was obscured by the jagged climbs of the Hamlet’s buildings. His heart leapt and his veins thrummed with urgency.

Then William rapped his knuckles on the table, and Reynauld turned back to the group in front of him.

“You were saying?” prompted William, petting Fi who had been roused by the sound.

Reynauld looked down at the blueprints again. The Sanguine Vintners, operated by two doctors and an eclectic alchemist lost on the Old Road, was in full production. The output of blood was steady, and their stores were mounting. The quarantine had been difficult to arrange, but the heir had relocated the family nearest to the sanitarium to allow their house to be repurposed into the quarantine barracks for the sake of expediency and convenience.

Paracelsus and Audrey, in repartees of curt affection and honeyed insults, had been arguing the benefits of installing an athenaeum and a guild hall respectively. A closer look by all those in attendance deepened the doubt as to the true layout and function of the guild hall. Paracelsus had only consolidated her proposal when she pointed out an athenaeum would aid the research into the Crimson Curse.

“As _I_ was saying,” said Audrey, slipping the blueprints of the guild hall out from underneath the athenaeum’s, “you make a good point, my dear, but don’t forget whose services you require in order to find the biological material for your study — or the vintners’.”

Paracelsus said flatly, “With any luck, not yours. The bells have sounded. Either that’s Villehardain and her group back from the Cove with a mountain of treasure, or it’s Mortmain, Barristan, Dismas, and Quièvremont with a trophy of the Baron. Either way, we don’t need a house of ill repute right now.”

“Speaking of,” said Junia, casting a glance towards Reynauld. He returned it with a grateful smile. “Let us go outside and see for ourselves.”

Paracelsus’ eyes lidded with disdain. “I’m not getting lost in the crowd again. You know the routine, Juni. Send them my way for decontamination.” Then she began to roll up the blueprints to the athenaeum whilst Alhazred approached her and spoke in quiet tones.

Reynauld, tempered by Junia’s presence at his elbow, controlled his speed to a brisk walk. He threw open the town hall’s doors, which screeched in protest at the abuse, and then hurried down the steps towards the town square.

Every excursion varied in length, but never more than a week was spent trying to accomplish a mission. The heir had made it very clear since Mowbray — Reynauld stifled his flinch — and Jingles had passed away. There were to be no more deaths, and no longer than a week away from the Hamlet.

It had been a year and a half since he, Dismas, and the heir had arrived at the Hamlet. Those tenets of hers still rung true.

But the bloodsuckers and their kin, their masters, had thrown the Hamlet off-kilter. The Crimson Curse couldn’t be cured with the mercy of the Light nor the medicines of the physicians. The occultists who communed with a darker creature, their own patron of madness, had tried their magic to no avail.

It was a curse indeed. It wasted away the flesh and minds of those afflicted unless treated with blood, as seen with Pont and Amani and the thankfully few others in quarantine.

Every day for the past seven days, Reynauld had kept an ear out for the bells. He had cleaned up the abbey, restored its office area with the help of the fellow crusader Cruel and the vestals, and partaken in the civil discussions about the Hamlet’s development. Every second had pricked his patience. Every thought had mired in his mind.

The last excursion to the Courtyard had taken five days. For seven days now, Reynauld had waited.

A gunshot split the air. Dismas’ flintlock. Junia flinched.

“Dismas?” she asked, whipping round to him.

Reynauld only gripped his longsword at his hip and ran towards the Old Road.

Four figures staggered in a broken line, propping each other up in a jagged shape of bowed heads and blundering feet. Reynauld waited at the statue in the square, breathing deeply to stay his fear. Some of the folk who had been roused by the bell were chittering at the added crack of the gunshot. He heard them jostle each other behind him, but squinted at the returning mercenaries.

One of them raised their hand. The point of a barrel smoked in their grip.

“They made it,” gasped Junia as she caught up to Reynauld. “What’s going on? Is there danger?”

Reynauld looked towards the scouting posts, but neither Quiet, Missandei, or the rogues — under their employ only by the scrutiny of Dismas’ leadership — sounded additional warnings.

“I don’t know,” he said brusquely.

He flexed his fingers on his longsword, paused, and then unsheathed it. Junia stepped back, still at his side but giving him space.

Dismas’ voice called out, but the noise from the townsfolk drowned it.

Reynauld roared, “Enough!”

They went silent.

The dark and dirty garbs of Mortmain and Quièvremont caught a sheen of old crimson in the afternoon light. Barristan was limping, one arm slung around Dismas’ shoulders, the other affixed to where his eyepatch should have been.

Dismas yelled again. “Blood!” Reynauld frowned. “Blood! Now!”

“Light above,” said Junia, and then turned towards the townsfolk. “You! Fetch Dive Beugelin, the doctor at The Sanguine Vintners! Tell him to bring a satchel of blood!”

Reynauld was aware of the scampering of feet and the renewed sough of hearsay sweeping through the town square. But he kept his eyes on Dismas and his party, who were approaching too slowly, threatening to collapse with every shambling movement. His throat was tight with emotion.

They had a quarantine. Those infected would be installed there immediately. They would be kept under close surveillance. There was blood aplenty and doctors at the nearby sanitarium. He had naught to worry about.

Dismas — his Dismas, the damned fool for returning to the Courtyard and its plague of bloodsuckers, the man who grounded him from the thrill of theft and shared his grisly humour when the dark was too close and supplies were low and the only heat was their bodies tucked together — would be safe.

_It’s settled,_ he thought. _The athenaeum will be the next to be built._

The party had just reached the outer ring of the Hamlet’s residency when Junia walked forwards with the satchel of blood vials. Reynauld flanked her side, resting the flat of his longsword on his right shoulder with both hands on the grip.

Dismas gazed at him for the entirety of their approach. His smile pulled at his lips as though a physician had pinned it to his cheek, exposing a snarl of teeth and stretching the scar that cut towards his chin.

The vertigo of horror that knocked into Reynauld made him miss a step. He stuttered on a breath and halted along with Junia, within earshot but out of arm’s reach. Light preserve him, he _would_ be strong.

What struck him was the absence of silence: the wheezing gasps of Barristan, Mortmain, and Quièvremont preluded their conversation, and Junia looked to Reynauld with steel in her eyes. Then she lay the satchel on the ground and motioned for him to retreat.

Like hounds on a kill, the three breathless mercenaries pounced on the satchel and dribbled blood along the ground and their knees as they unstoppered the vials even before they left the bag. Then they were gulping it down, moaning and gibbering in indistinct barks. Reynauld pointed the longsword at them. They slathered the blood into their mouths, Quièvremont nearly swallowing a vial, Mortmain pulling at her hood and exposing the sweaty skin. Barristan’s damaged eye was indeed uncovered.

There was no victory in their greed — only pity and disgust, a bitter humiliation to watch Junia’s sister of the cloth cower for the blood and a proud man-at-arms sully himself on the ground. Reynauld wanted to turn with shame, to give them a moment of dignity. But he looked to Dismas instead.

Dismas, who wiped his forehead on his sleeve and sighed.

“Straight to quarantine?” he said dryly.

“You—” Reynauld struggled to compose himself, but Dismas was patient. “You’re not…?”

“Luck of the devil.” The dart of his eyes towards Barristan hinted there was more to it than that, as if Reynauld didn’t know Barristan would die for his comrades and shield them till his strength failed. Then Dismas clapped his hands, though the sound was muffled by his gloves. “Let’s not waste time, then, and get these poor buggers into the Hamlet.”

Junia stepped in. “ _You’re_ going straight to the sanitarium.”

“Easy, Juni. I ain’t received my hero’s welcome from Rey yet.” He winked at Reynauld. “What’s keeping you, love?”

Reynauld swallowed the lump in his throat. “We have new measures in place. To prevent the spread of the Curse in any method it might be transmitted.”

Dismas holstered his pistol and barked a laugh. “Aye, but I’ll miss your kisses.” He sobered, meeting Reynauld’s eyes, now embered with a touch of warmth. “I’ve missed you.”

Reynauld nodded, throat caulked with grief and happiness in lurching measures. Then Junia called out to Mortmain, who sobbed into the collar of her hood, and Dismas steadied Barristan back onto his feet.

“Come on, you old fool. Plenty more where that came from. Just a little further.”

Barristan threw his head back. “I am the fury!” he rumbled, swinging his shield in a drunken swipe. “I am the fires that rage eternally—”

“Yes, my brother!” Quièvremont bumped into Mortmain, clinging to her side as she trailed after Junia. “Tell it to the heavens! The Light has never been closer, don’t you _see_ , sister?”

Junia shot a glare at him: a lightning wrath that struck Quièvremont silent. Reynauld took up the rear, checking that no bloodsuckers had followed them from the Courtyard, and then escorted the party back to the Hamlet proper.

Barristan still bellowed and belched as they reached the town square, earning the citizens’ curiosity. But at least neither him, Quièvremont, or Mortmain tried to exsanguinate them. Dismas waved to Audrey, who was perched at the foot of the statue. She tipped the dagger balanced on the pad of her finger into her hand.

“Still alive, you filthy scallywag?” she called.

“Watch your tongue!” roared Barristan. Dismas patted him and then flung his arm out towards the tavern.

“Where’s our baby, our golden child?” he said in what Reynauld recognised as mock anger. “Thought you were gonna get it built?”

“ _You_ try your hand at politics! I think I’d rather face the bloodsuckers!”

Reynauld ground his teeth and stared at the sanitarium ahead of him. The door to the quarantine barracks was overseen by Alhazred, who watched the procession. Mortmain caught Junia’s attention, and they exchanged quiet words, Junia’s mask of composure melting with her smile. Then Mortmain was the first inside, Alhazred bowing his head to her, and then Quièvremont and Barristan were coaxed in as well.

Quièvremont howled and beat at Dismas, who had taken Mortmain’s equipment and was trying to relinquish Quièvremont of his scourge.

“No! Lead me to the abbey! I must atone for my weakness!”

His nails narrowly missed Dismas’ cheek and Reynauld strode forwards. He swung his longsword up and cracked its hilt into Quièvremont’s temple. Quièvremont gasped and staggered into Junia’s arms. Dismas gave Reynauld a fleeting, grateful look, and then heaved all of Quièvremont’s possessions off his person, wrinkling his nose at the blood.

Barristan sighed as he gave up his shield and mace, but the sorrow in his face warped into fervour as he sniffed and caught something on the wind, almost as attentive as Fi. He scrambled for the quarantine barracks, and Alhazred reached out to close the door and lock it.

“I’ll take those,” he said to Dismas, who dropped his party’s possessions into his arms. Junia picked up those that couldn’t fit in his embrace. “Thank you, Junia. Shall we?”

He swept past the quarantine and headed for the sanitarium, unfazed by the voices crying from inside. Reynauld’s skin crawled, but his intervention with Quièvremont had brought him close to Dismas — not close enough to fill Dismas’ empty hands with his own, or even appreciate the fine details of his old scars across his face, but enough that his eyes meeting Reynauld’s were visibly clear. Tired, but clear.

“Bloody hell.” He rolled his neck and then his shoulders. Reynauld made a silent promise to help him stretch after he was vetted. “Let’s get this over with.”

A pace apart, Reynauld walked with him, the two of them trailing after Junia and Alhazred. “What happened?” he said softly.

“The same as last time — except we weren’t lucky. It was Barristan first.” Dismas let out a huff. “It was always gonna be him. Bastard. Plate didn’t save him.”

His last words seemed to be directed towards Reynauld, but he felt no irritation or indignation. He understood why the heir and all his friends in the Hamlet had discouraged him from going. He didn’t have Barristan’s shield, or Mortmain’s focus, or Quièvremont’s savagery.

But he _did_ have Dismas, and that would have been inspiration enough to see him through the Courtyard. It was enough to have Dismas alive, his voice broken as cobbles, his back stooped, than being fodder for the bloodsuckers, left in the Courtyard to bleed and bloat.

“Then it was Mortmain. I _hate_ those little manservant leeches. They come up to your knees, Rey, and you think you can kick them off, but then their pointy bit sticks into your thigh and they swell to double their size. You can see your blood in their cheeks.”

Dismas glanced at him, and Reynauld realised the quiet keening noise had come from _him_. Dismas grinned, tilting his head as if reassessing him in this new light.

“We were out of blood,” he continued, and his amusement faded. “Treasure aplenty in our bags. We knew where the Baron was, marked it down on the map. As we were making our getaway, Quièvremont aggravated some of the sycophantic mozzies. It wasn’t his fault, really.”

Reynauld swallowed hard. “It wasn’t anyone’s.”

Dismas splayed his hands. “Has to be _someone’s_ fault I’m the only one untouched.”

He went to climb the steps to the sanitarium, his back to Reynauld, who flared with a cold desperation. He lunged and caught Dismas’ hand. Junia, perhaps alerted by the drop in conversation, paused and looked over her shoulder. Her gaze landed on the brown and red of his and Dismas’ intertwined gloves, before it flitted to Reynauld with a warning in its glare.

She continued up the stairs. Reynauld tugged at Dismas’ hand.

“Not for lack of trying,” he growled, and slid his hand up Dismas’ cuff, drawing the sleeve back to the punctures in his skin that had bled through to his coat. Pale skin puckered in green bruises. Dismas scowled, and Reynauld rubbed his wrist with his thumb, still firm enough to keep him still. “Untouched by the curse, perhaps, but how many times were you attacked? You parried and bled for your _life_. You stand here clear of the curse, and you think there is a judgement to be weighed? A sin to be carried?”

Dismas shook off Reynauld’s hand and pulled his sleeve back. “It’s not that philosophical, love. Anyway, enough about me. Did you veto my guild hall idea?”

“It wasn’t your idea, it’s not even a guild hall! Dismas, you—”

Reynauld tried not to despair, and raised his head to the sky, wishing the summer was a little less vigorous. The spring rains had barely ceased when the bloodsuckers had sprawled across the land. He missed their first summer together in the Hamlet. Peace had felt more attainable then, without the constant whine of mosquitoes.

He sighed, and then looked down at Dismas again. “You’re keeping Paracelsus waiting.”

Dismas snorted, muttering, “Wonder why,” and then stomped up the steps.

“Ask _her_ about your guild hall,” said Reynauld loudly.

Not facing him, Dismas groaned, and the petulance of it brought a smile to Reynauld’s face.

It was enough. It was more than enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come visit my [tumblr](http://samiltonbattmann.tumblr.com/)!


	4. Chapter 4

The ruins of the gentry’s chateaus, sucked and sunken into the swamps, emerged from the trees. After the green key had stuck into the gate, Dismas had peered into the distance — the long boulevard of paved stone, a welcome change from the cobbles and mud of the labyrinth — and immediately hailed his friends together.

Mortmain’s cheeks were flushed red and bulging, the skin worn through near her lips where Dismas thought he spied the white of bone or tooth. She scratched her mouth incessantly whilst they had walked back to the Courtyard from the Hamlet. But she enunciated her prayers well enough, so he couldn’t fault her for that.

In between admiring the stone pillars and broken walls of old houses, Dismas had kept an eye on Quièvremont and Barristan. Back at home, word of the infected’s mutated state had swept through the Hamlet like wildfire. The idea that Pont’s back had grown so sheer that one could see the veins through his skin, even through the rugged scars of his flagellation, and then said skin had _flayed open_ into a pair of insectile wings, was monstrous enough for Dismas to duck behind his friends and watch on their backs with particular vigilance.

No such wings had emerged during their return to the Courtyard. But Dismas could envision the fine, glass-like chitin unfolding from their flesh all too easily.

Quièvremont seethed with his bloodlust. He radiated heat when Dismas stood by him, hands never still on the grip of his scourge. The courtyard’s bushes had all receded to the feet of the ruins. Only the Baron’s courtyard to his estate lay before them, and it was Quièvremont who breached it first.

Where the full grandeur of his manor must have stood were only the bisected wings of two storeys in a crown around the centre courtyard, slanted into the soft ground over time. The windows of each building were shadowed by balconies, the doors hanging by their hinges. Moss draped from the roofs. Dismas drew out his flintlock and dirk. His friends readied themselves a second after.

Clinging to the buildings, mushrooming from every corner and every slab of stone in bulbous balloons throbbing with the force of their contents, were bloodsucker egg sacs. Some sprouted in clusters up to Dismas’ waist, whilst others bulged like undulating statues. The daylight wasn’t strong, but the silhouettes inside were dark enough to perceive through the membranes. Dismas’ throat went dry. Some were definitely large enough to house the chevaliers.

Mortmain gave a loud gasp, and Dismas shot a look at her. Saliva glistened over her lips and chin as she reached out towards a nearby sac.

“How vile,” she murmured. Her hand smoothed over the membrane, and Dismas twitched, hunching down with his flintlock up. “To think the Baron prepared all of these for us.”

“If he thinks he can swarm us with numbers, he has underestimated our journey through the Courtyard.” Barristan raised his shield and eased Mortmain away from the sac. She glared at him. “Let me face them first.”

“Everyone, stay back,” said Dismas vehemently. He scanned the manor courtyard, but saw only the crowds of eggs, so densely packed they obscured the ground. “The Baron’s around here somewhere. He did say this was a game in his invite.”

“What, pray tell, is the game here?” said Mortmain. “Are we waiting for his grand entrance? An entourage, perhaps? A horn to announce the games have begun?”

Quièvremont barked a laugh. “Well, I’m not waiting!” he snarled, and raised his scourge. Heart leaping in fear, Dismas lunged forwards. “The games end here!”

The metal stars of his scourge tore through the nearest sac, and Dismas changed his direction to duck behind Quièvremont as a cloud of mosquitoes bloomed in the air, buzzing and whining so loud Dismas couldn’t even hear his own cry of anger. He felt Quièvremont shake — _more_ laughter, the madman — and whip his scourge through the air.

Dismas swerved and slashed, intensely glad for his neckerchief as mosquitoes flitted around his face. One was large enough to cling to the whole of Quièvremont’s arm, its wings vibrating in a maddeningly shrill drone. Its black body glistened, the proboscis buried deep into Quièvremont’s right shoulder. He snatched its thorax and squeezed. It burst in a bloody slime, chitin splitting under his grip.

Quièvremont grinned at Dismas and shook his hand free of the gore. Dismas wiped his forehead with his sleeve.

“Fucking hell,” he said furiously. “We ain’t doing that to all the eggs. We can’t.”

“The Baron must be here,” declared Barristan, squashing a smaller, more normal variety of mosquito against his vambrace. He raised his head and surveyed the courtyard. “I can feel it. Hear his laughter.”

Against his better judgement, Dismas strained his hearing. No laughter carried through the hum of the flies, and he scowled at Barristan. If his friends were going to be delirious, he needed them to at least direct their delirium towards the Baron.

“Okay, okay,” said Dismas, catching Mortmain and Quièvremont’s attentions as they wandered around the sacs. “Keep together. Let’s look for the Baron. If he’s hiding in here, we’ll find him. But we _do not_ split up, and we don’t open any more fucking eggs unless everyone agrees the Baron might be in one. All right?”

“Sounds slow and boring,” drawled Quièvremont, and Dismas watched him carefully as he bumped against an egg sac. He patted it almost apologetically and then gestured towards the sea of egg sacs. “But I want the Baron’s head as much as you.”

Dismas looked towards Mortmain, who clawed at her cheek. “If you don’t get a move on, I will,” she said lowly, her bloodshot eyes burning into him.

The last time they had been in the Courtyard, Dismas had heard distant cheering during his nighttime vigil, goading them into the bowels of the swamp. He cocked an ear for anything similar as the four of them got back into formation and squeezed and tiptoed past the clutches of eggs.

“What do we think the Baron looks like?” said Quièvremont lightly, his voice carrying over his shoulder to Dismas.

Dismas grunted. With any luck, the massive columns of eggs _were_ chevaliers and esquires, because at least he knew how to deal with them. There was a squelch and a loud curse; Mortmain had stepped into a misshapen sac, and from its membrane clawed a bloodsucker. It garbled at her. Dismas aimed his pistol down, but Barristan and Mortmain had already caved its head in with their weapons.

He waited for an extra second in case they decided to fill their stomachs with their latest prey, and then gestured back to Quièvremont to continue through the courtyard. Quièvremont huffed.

“Keep moving,” snapped Dismas, jerking the point of his dirk forwards.

Quièvremont smiled and gestured towards him. “I think we have an audience vying for a closer look.”

Dismas frowned, and followed Quièvremont’s finger to the cluster of sacs growing underneath the west wing’s portico. The shadows of the courtyard were stained dark red by the bloody wash long dried on its stones, but nothing could hide the flash of white from Dismas’ eye as something darted between the ruins and the eggs. It scuttled and ducked behind a taller variety of eggs.

Dismas took a deep breath, warm and humid through his neckerchief. Though his heartbeat skittered like a rabbit on the run, he grounded himself with his knees bent and weight lowered to the ground, just like Reynauld had taught him, and crossed his dirk over his pistol as he aimed at the sliver of white peeking from behind the egg sac.

“Brace yourselves, folks,” he said, and allowed a split second for his party to snap to attention before he fired.

The creature shrieked and flailed, its long arms shredding through the sac’s membrane. It bucked backwards and Mortmain yelled to the Light, brandishing her mace until its radiance burst into the darkness of portico, a shaft of light splitting the air.

A wig askew on its head, its lower half bulging into a large, round, dirty white abdomen that bristled with thick hairs along its segments, the bloodsucker that reared up screamed in a gargling chortle. From the egg it ruptured spewed a human body marionetted by a familiar bloodsucker; its bulb-like abdomen flared red, and the body staggered to its feet whilst antennae wriggled where its head had been.

The party were already on the move, Barristan feinting at the supplicating bloodsucker whilst Mortmain took cover behind one of the eggs. Quièvremont sprinted past Dismas with his scourge rattling. The massive bloodsucker lashed out and its arm — more of a whip, pink and barbed and leathery — caught Quièvremont across the face. Quièvremont staggered. Dismas slotted another shot into his flintlock and tamped it down, glancing furtively between the bloodsuckers and the heaving eggs around them.

“The Baron!” shouted Mortmain. She caught Quièvremont’s arm and steadied him, dazed as he was. “Focus on the Baron!”

Barristan roared as the bloodsucker in front of him heaved bile onto his shield. The other bloodsucker, with its wig and wet black eyes and bloodied coat, lunged out from the portico. The shadows peeled away to reveal the open maw across its stomach. _The Baron it can only be_ , thought Dismas.

He cocked the flint back on his pistol and then scrambled for cover as the Baron rushed towards him. Its many feet split the egg sacs with loud squelches. Dismas peered around his cover to see Mortmain summon another flash of light right in the eyes of a small manservant of a bloodsucker.

Barristan pierced the front of his shield into the writhing mouth of the supplicant. Behind it were another two, awakened by the Baron. The mucus of their eggs still sloughed off their hosts’ bodies, gleaming fresh on their red abdomens.

The Baron barrelled through the eggs, and Dismas primed his shot, before it changed direction at the last second to where Quièvremont was screaming fit to burst at the sycophants crowded around him.

Dismas fired at the Baron’s torso, hoping there was still some vulnerable flesh underneath its coat that would bleed. But the Baron cackled and charged towards Quièvremont. It threw its arms forwards, and bursting from its sleeves were teeth. Quièvremont turned a split second before the teeth tore across his arms and shoulders. Blood sprayed into the air and into the open mouth at the Baron’s waist.

Then Barristan cried in pain, and Dismas damned everything to hell as he dropped his flintlock and sprinted out of cover with his dirk.

Mortmain was stamping on a bloodsucker, and Dismas swore she snapped at him when he dragged her away. They backed up towards Barristan, who had held his own against the bloodsuckers.

“Barristan!” shouted Dismas, looking at Quièvremont and the Baron trading blows whilst the eggs around them wobbled unsteadily. Mortmain’s half-garbled prayer and the seams of light around Quièvremont told Dismas he was at least being healed. But their little defensive circle couldn’t hold for long. “Tactics?”

There was a wet crunch of Barristan crushing something with his morningstar. “Move your feet!” he roared.

“That’s real fucking helpful, you bloody senile piece of damned—”

The rest of his curse was ground into a growl as a bloodsucker shambled towards him and Mortmain. He sliced through its neck and huffed in vicious satisfaction as it fell.

They needed a plan. There were too many bloodsuckers, and only so many sacks of blood for them to feed on.

Dismas inhaled sharply. Light above, he hoped they survived long enough to worry about what happened after the Baron was dead.

He grabbed Mortmain’s sleeve. She whirled round to him, her face streaked with gore, teeth bared and eyes washed in red.

“Mortmain,” he said desperately, “I need you and Barristan to lure the bloodsuckers away. Back towards the entrance. Can you do that?”

She panted in his face. Her breath stung his eyes.

“Get a grip and listen to me, Mortmain. The entrance. Draw the bloodsuckers to the entrance. Use the light to herd them away from me and Quièvremont.”

“I don’t—” There was a whimper in her voice, underneath the heat and iron. She shook her head.

“You can do it,” he said, letting go of her sleeve to pat her arm. “Now get out of here, and when we’re done, I’ll tell you how I make my candles smell like amber.”

She barked a laugh. “Ridiculous.” But Dismas saw with relief her heft her mace up and stumble towards the entrance to the Baron’s courtyard.

Quièvremont was also retreating towards them, overwhelmed by the Baron’s pincers and its lash-like arms. Bile rose in Dismas’ throat at the heavy coat of blood over him. Some battles had fared poorly in the past, but now Quièvremont looked like he was on death’s door.

But he was putting obstacles between him and the Baron — chunks of fountain debris, towering egg sacs, bloodsuckers screaming as they tried to avoid the Baron’s advancement — so Dismas tore his gaze away and kicked Barristan’s shin.

Barristan’s voice broke in his cry as he swung his morningstar out. It caught Dismas’ arm — his left, his pistol arm, a mercy to be sure — which exploded in a firework of pain. Dismas hissed, but there was no time to chide.

He slung his haversack off his shoulders and shoved it at Barristan, who stared at him.

“The vials of blood,” he said, and ripped off the haversack’s clasp. “Dribble them towards the entrance. Lure the bloodsuckers to you. Do _not_ drink, I swear on the Ancestor’s filthy knickers, you have to listen to me.”

Barristan heaved for breath, his eye darting around the courtyard, where Dismas could hear Quièvremont and the Baron and all the bloodsuckers in motion. Then he grabbed the haversack. “Tactics,” he said gruffly.

Dismas nodded. “Shield Mortmain, too. We’ll need her help.”

As Barristan caught up with Mortmain, Dismas hoped their bloodlust would abate enough for them to carry out his orders.

Orders. He would have scoffed, had he not put the air to better use and ran towards Quièvremont to impale a manservant’s head with his dirk. He was no Barristan, but greed was a loaded dice, and it rolled true every time. And the bloodsuckers were very, very greedy.

The manservant kicked off from his dirk, Dismas stepped to Quièvremont’s flank and faced the oncoming Baron.

“Y’alright,” he slurred to Quièvremont, who dragged his bloody fist across his grinning mouth.

Then a branding pain whipped across his face, and Dismas reeled, slashing outwards in retaliation. His dirk met resistance, though he was too blinded by the shock and sting of the attack to appreciate his riposte.

But the pain was nothing to the ensuing blare of laughter, chittering and shrill, a crowd of voices exploding in yowling glee. His ears rang and he cowered, unable to escape the noise that surrounded him, as if the other bloodsuckers had joined the Baron’s hilarity.

Yet warm liquid drenched his knife hand. No matter how loud the Baron laughed, it still bled like any other monster. And Dismas had killed a _lot_ of monsters.

He used the cuff of his left hand to wipe away the tears from his eyes. His cheeks smarted, inflamed with pain, but he could now see the Baron staggered back. Its right sleeve flailed, and, flopping on the floor like a fish on its last choking throes, was the rest of its arm. Both of the Baron’s mouths jumped as it laughed.

In its distraction, Dismas darted to where Quièvremont had fallen to one knee. His shoulders heaved, his skin gleamed in a film of blood, but still he stared up at the Baron.

“What I once feared,” he snarled, and pushed himself up with a hand on nearby debris, “I have become. For the Light, I suffer!” He spat out a ruddy glob at the Baron. “Let the rivers of blood rain on me! I am no stranger to the taste!”

The Baron’s head snapped down. Dismas saw himself in its glistening eyes. All around its feet were bloodsuckers, either crushed or lurching their way towards him and Quièvremont. Dismas primed his dirk.

An excruciating heat flashed against his back and lit up the faces in front of him. He flinched, and dared to look over his shoulder to where an esquire, huge and teeth bared and proboscis wet, drew away from where it had crept up on him, stunned by the light. Dismas had half a second to baulk at the sheer number of bloodsuckers behind him — an army, an impossible horde — before he realised they were all facing away from him and Quièvremont.

Instead, they faced the entrance, cutting their way through the remaining eggs and the slain corpses to where Mortmain’s mace peeked in the air.

He sucked in a breath and smelled blood. Every one of his senses was overwhelmed by the chaos of the courtyard — but the Baron was lunging again, and there was no time to give in.

Quièvremont moved first, his entire body swinging with the movement of bringing his scourge round. It clashed against the Baron’s side, and there was the mocking howl again. Dismas skidded past him and snatched the Baron’s dangling sleeve. The Baron’s instinctive recoil and Dismas’ own heave brought him straight into its face, and he yelled with the effort, hanging on with one hand whilst he plunged down with his dirk.

Teeth cinched around his hand and forearm, and his yell turned into a scream as they broke skin and pierced to the bone. The Baron threw its head back, and now, so close he could see the terror in his own eyes in the black beady reflections, he could not escape the laughter. His dirk stabbed into its shoulder, and then Dismas fell.

More teeth, rows and rows of teeth, caught his fall. His stomach seized with pain as every sharpened fang sank into his gut and through his back. He dragged down with his dirk but it lost its purchase, and then the jaws closed, and he twisted and shouted as the Baron leered down at him and yet he was stuck in its abdomen, and his body was breaking—

Lightning cracked through the air and the jaws opened. A pair of arms hooked underneath his. He thrashed in its hold, but then Quièvremont’s strained voice hissed in his ear: “This is _my_ burden. You shall not suffer for it.”

There were chevaliers scuttling behind the Baron, towering up and clicking their mandibles, esquires and courtesans lashing their tongues out as they tore off their egg membranes, and Quièvremont was behind him, propping him to his feet at the same time he fended off a sycophant.

The air smelled sweet, and Dismas’ throat was very, very dry. Blood was pooling at his feet from the dead bloodsuckers. He gasped for breath. The colour red was so enticing.

_It’s a curse,_ he thought in a panic, _it’s a curse and I’m cursed and I’m one of them. But like hell I’m going to die here with them._

Dismas gritted his teeth, steadied himself, and then launched forwards. The Baron’s stomach opened again, and its one remaining whip-like arm whistled through the air, but Dismas planted one foot straight into its maw and pushed up. He wrested his dirk from its shoulder and as the Baron cackled, he thrust his hand into its open mouth and grappled its tongue.

Its entire body jerked with surprise, and then, pulled taut by his grip, Dismas shoved his dirk straight into its head.

The skull burst, and Dismas keened at the warmth of blood. But it was only for a second, because he wrapped the tongue around his wrist and tore it out. Quièvremont was saying something; he couldn’t hear over the ringing in his ears as the Baron’s body slumped and he fell for a second time.

His vision swam. Exhaustion blanketed him like a funeral pall, dark and heavy, and he couldn’t think except for the rhythm of his breaths and the thirst that clawed at his throat. He had to move, though. The bloodsuckers would come for him. They would drink from him, and he could never return to the Hamlet.

He was so thirsty. Light above, he hoped Barristan and Mortmain had spared some vials. He licked the inside of his mouth and hated the fizz of delight that warmed him at the metallic taste.

Groaning, he turned his head towards a moving blur. There was the Baron’s arm, swinging through the air in graceful arcs, as if moved by a practised hand. He frowned. The Baron had to be dead. He killed the Baron. He’d seen the life leave its eyes. He couldn’t have failed.

The red blur turned and grinned at him. Quièvremont. His scourge was in one hand and the severed arm was in the other. There were screeches and pattering as the bloodsuckers around him fled at the branding touch of the Baron’s arm. Dismas clenched his hand. His fingers squeezed the tongue. _Good_ , he thought, relieved it was intact.

“Dismas!”

A bloodsucker appeared over his head, and he silently begged for a moment of peace. This one, however, wore a hood and spattered breastplate. When Mortmain’s voice sounded in time to the wriggle of the nascent mandibles, Dismas relaxed.

His flesh knitting together and his vision clearing was salvation enough for him to cough out his thanks. His stomach still felt raw, and his clothes were dyed the same colour as Quièvremont’s habit, but he was alive, and he was still so very thirsty.

Mortmain was knelt next to him. Her face was burning in a florid flush; the skin by her lips had finally been scratched away to a pair of small, sharp mandibles. Where her eyes had been bloodshot, now they were blotted so deeply he couldn’t separate her pupils from the whites, or lack thereof.

A full body shudder took ahold of him. At least he was sound enough to shudder at all.

“Better take that thing off him,” he rasped, and jerked his head towards Quièvremont, who was still sending the bloodsuckers away with the crack of the arm. “Or else they’re gonna have a field day in the penance halls.”

Mortmain glanced towards Quièvremont, and she said something too quickly for Dismas’ still healing brain to understand. Then she looked back at him and began her chants anew. Meanwhile, Barristan approached Quièvremont, crushing a wounded bloodsucker before he reached for the whip. Quièvremont recoiled.

“Easy, easy! Give that to me, son!”

“No! This is my prize! Let them fear the Light and its adherents! There is no nightmare we cannot conquer!” He clambered onto the Baron’s body and stood on its large white abdomen with his fist raised. The bloodsuckers were all halfway out of the courtyard as he screamed, “Let all the damned denizens of the Courtyard know: _les jeux sont faits_! The Courtyard shall be cleansed in the name of the Light!”

Whilst he was distracted, Barristan grabbed the other end of the arm and tugged on it. Quièvremont staggered and almost fell off the Baron, but he was too busy cackling to argue with Barristan. Instead, he cradled his scourge, and then Mortmain hissed in pain, and Dismas turned his stare to her.

She saw his attention and snapped her holy book shut. “You can walk now.” She turned and headed towards Barristan.

“Oh, but I was looking forward to you carrying me back to the Hamlet on Barristan’s shield! Are you sure that’s not an option?”

She ignored him, huddling with Barristan to put the arm into her haversack, and Dismas took the hint to recover his own pistol and belongings. The pistol was impossible to find amidst the gore and corpses. However, he knew that his growing anxiety, the still racing beat of his heart and heat in his cheeks, wasn’t solely because of its loss.

He drank from his waterskin, but it was like air for all of the good it did. His throat prickled, barbed-dry as a desert plant, and he knew with every second that passed what could and would slake it. He could taste it in the air, a tempting note of the full sanguine body. A headache pulsed behind his eyes.

But he gathered what he could find of his belongings, wary of any bloodsuckers that might not have gotten the message of their master’s defeat, and then regrouped with Barristan, Mortmain, and Quièvremont.

Quièvremont was kneeling and whipping himself. Dismas didn’t know how to stop him. His hands were so bloody, they slipped on the scourge and the tails swung wide. He looked to Barristan and Mortmain for support, but they were too busy trying to support themselves, leaning against each other.

So Dismas sighed, and quietly approached Quièvremont. “Hey. Quièvre.” The scourge connected; Quièvremont’s back dribbled afresh. Dismas tore his gaze from it, though it was as difficult as trying to wipe his hands of honey. “It’s over. Come on now.”

“My penance,” said Quièvremont huskily. “I have to atone.”

“Not right here, my friend. There’s a penance hall back home waiting just for you.”

He held out his hand, and after an eternity of mosquito droning and the ragged breaths drawn from each of their party, Quièvremont used it to pull himself up. Dismas caught himself before he could lick his own hand clean.

They staggered back to Mortmain and Barristan.

“Well,” said Dismas as brightly as he could whilst his friends wheezed, “let’s not waste another second in this hellhole. You’ll be wanting another bath, right, Mortmain?”

“Do you have any blood in your bag?” she said thickly.

“No. Only the Baron’s tongue for the ol’ beaks in the sanitarium.”

She looked at Quièvremont, who shook his head.

“Then we have none left,” she whispered. Dismas went cold, his smile dropping. Barristan nodded gravely. “We poured what we could and hurled the rest to catch their attention.” She hid her eyes, and Dismas was helpless to hear her sob for a second, a bark of despair and tears, before she dried her eyes and looked up.

“We’ll find something,” said Barristan, nudging her affectionately before he steadied himself on his own two feet. “We’re in the Courtyard, after all. Plenty of blood.”

But his voice seemed to fade, and there was no echoing encouragement. Quièvremont took point, and Barristan followed after. But Mortmain’s legs were unsteady, and Dismas saw her tripping before it could happen. He ducked underneath her flailing arm and bowed with her weight.

Their steps were small and halting, but each one took them closer to the Hamlet and away from the Courtyard. At that point, that was all Dismas could ask for.

"Keep talking to me,” he said softly to Mortmain. Her mandibles twitched, and he tried not to shiver again. “You know what they say: secrets told in the Courtyard stay in the Courtyard.”

“That’s such shit, Dismas, you always come out with absolute drivel.”

“No no, I have the Baron to back me up here.” He wiggled his free arm in a loose, uncoordinated wave, clapped his fingers against his thumb in a farce of a mouth, and tried a cackle. It caught in his throat, serrated into hacking cough. Mortmain laughed all the same. “Go on, love. Keep talking.”

They were walking down the boulevard when she finally spoke again. “We’re not going to make it, are we? The sisters will be so angry. I think I'm scared of Sister Junia, sometimes. I want to go back home, to the long grass and acres of tomato vines. I hate the soup kitchen. It’s not real soup. Have you ever tried goat’s cheese with onion soup?

“Oh Dismas, my veins are burning. We’re not going to make it.”

She cried the rest of the way.


	5. Chapter 5

The report of a pistol cracked through the air. A puff of straw from the dummy on the other side of the training ring indicated the successful shot.

Reynauld packed the pistol, reloaded, tamped it, and then aimed again. The gunsmith had lingered to see how well her creation worked. The blacksmith hovered behind her, his wilted eyes eagerly trained on the new flintlock pistol in Reynauld’s hand.

This time, the pistol fired, and the peal of bullet pinging metal rang with the gunshot. Reynauld smiled. More than success this time: accuracy. Though dented and rusty, the dummy’s piecemeal plating over its head and chest was still intact enough to give him an idea of when he was hitting its splayed straw arms and joints, or when he had hit something vital.

The musketeer Quiet’s skill with long-range firearms was uncontested, though Dismas had mused on his curiosity to try a rifle at some point. In the meantime, Reynauld hoped he would be satisfied with the new flintlock pistol and dirk he had commissioned for Dismas’ return. If Dismas expressed a vested interest in rifles, then the gunsmith had assured Reynauld of her excitement to procure one to his liking.

He peered down the barrel for a moment longer, focusing on the pistol’s weight in his hand, and then lowered it. The dummy would receive a more rigorous battering later. For now, Reynauld buffed the barrel of any smut from the gunpowder with his sleeve, and then turned to request the pistol’s holster. The gunsmith smiled at him, sensing he was pleased. The dirk in its scabbard and the pistol’s holster were already held out to him.

Two bell tolls rang. Reynauld looked sharply down the street, grip tightening on the flintlock. Then he darted towards the gunsmith, casting her a quick thanks for her work as he took the proffered equipment, and ran towards the town square with his heart in his throat and a wary excitement nipping at his heels.

A week or so was the average duration of an expedition. It had only been three days. _A sure sign of success_ , thought Reynauld firmly, excusing himself to the townspeople he pushed past. The heir had requested all other expeditions be postponed until the Courtyard team returned — or not — so that the best team for a retrieval could be assembled at once.

Reynauld knew Tardif had been champing at the bit to see the Courtyard for himself. Whilst some had avoided even crossing by the street of the quarantine barracks, others like Tardif had made a point to discuss the Crimson Curse with the doctors and researchers and peer through the boarded windows. Should a disaster have befallen the Courtyard team, Reynauld had no doubt Tardif would be the first to put himself forwards for a rescue team.

The market was in full swing around the town square when Reynauld put himself at the fore, holster snug around the pistol, buckled to his waist along with the dirk, to free his hands to better receive Dismas. Dismas would be glad to hear of the candle shop’s profits, although in his absence there had been no new stock to replenish the shelves.

Of course, as promising as his side enterprise was, Reynauld hoped it wouldn’t overshadow the commissioned equipment, which he worried with his thumb as he stared down the Old Road for a familiar horizon.

The minutes passed with the easing of the townspeople’s attention away from the Old Road and back towards their daily business. Reynauld frowned at them. None of his friends had emerged from their vocations, either.

But he was certain he had heard the two rings of the bell to signal a party’s return. Perhaps he had imagined it: an echo of the gunshot in the training yard, or the clamour of the construction work perpetually in motion around the Hamlet to accommodate their growing numbers and pursuits.

He started walking towards the Old Road, past the outer residencies, and away from the upbeat commotion of the town square. Once away from the houses and upon the open road, a loping figure descended the hills and met him on the cobbles.

The long, corkscrew horns on his head bobbed with his ground-eating gait. Reynauld stopped to watch the abomination bound up to him, all corded muscle the colour of rust and a snout that snarled in a fearsome visage. The clinking of chains matched his rhythm; their new mechanism meant they sat around his waist almost like a belt. Luckily, the new trousers Audrey had made for him accommodated this change.

The abomination approached Reynauld and paused to recover his breath.

“Bigby,” said Reynauld, letting his surprise keep his voice light when worry threatened to darken it. Bigby grunted. “What ails you?”

His voice was still a grinding thing, a sawtoothed thunder that scraped at his throat into words. But it was a long way from where he had begun, as a creature of snarls and howls. He had Boudicca to thank for that, Reynauld understood. Her vocalisation was second to none.

“Come from scouts,” said Bigby, chuffing breaths that singed with venom. His r’s rolled with his next words. “Warning. Party needs help. Boudicca, Baldwin, already gone.”

Reynauld launched into a run, and Bigby bounded beside him. A cold thrill of dread passed through him.

Bigby grunted, but his panting broke the words into formless puffs. Reynauld nodded anyway, and Bigby overtook him, striding into the thicket that swallowed the rest of the Old Road and leaving Reynauld to run after him and think of all the reasons why the party would need help.

He should have brought blood. Last time, Dismas had called for blood. The scouting posts had been supplied with a small batch each, but there was no saying whether Boudicca or Baldwin had remembered to take some to greet the party.

Perhaps — Reynauld gritted his teeth to bite down the thought as it rose unbidden — they would be too far gone for that anyway.

The shadows of the woods fell over him. The cobblestones had turned to mud. He saw colours of fabric through the trees where the road winded through, and picked up his pace. He didn’t know what he would find. But he prayed for Dismas, alive, at the very least alive, and sane. The Light would be merciful. It was all he asked.

He would bow to the deaths of Barristan, Quièvremont, stalwart Mortmain — but to the death of Dismas, he would break. There was no doubt in his mind of that. His chest seized terribly at the thought.

Boudicca and Baldwin were standing in the middle of the road. Reynauld drew up to them, as breathless as Bigby who was hunched just beyond them, to the people they encircled. Baldwin turned, his sword splattered with blood. Reynauld froze in fear.

“Do not come closer, for their sake and yours,” said Baldwin simply.

Reynauld drew himself to his full height and unsheathed both the new dirk and pistol. “What’s going on? Where’s Dismas?”

Baldwin watched him approach, bristling with the power behind his threat. But Reynauld would not cower. Baldwin would do the same for Sarmenti. They both knew this. He would not be daunted.

So Baldwin said, not moving but letting Reynauld find space beside him, “They are recovering from their fatigue. They were wasting away on the Old Road, limping together towards the Hamlet, and collapsed when we approached. They have since drunk their fill from our stock of blood.”

Reynauld looked down at the pile of bodies on the ground and almost couldn’t tell where one person began and the other ended, slumped together and garbed in red so glossy it was like the satin of Junia’s sleeves. But it was impossible to miss the stench of blood, nor the shallow breaths they all took.

He knew Barristan’s plate armour, however. He was the centre point of the huddle, still a bastion of strength despite the gore streaked across his armour and the slack twist of his arms. Buckled forwards, only the top of his head was visible.

Tucked into his side, facing away from him, someone heaved a wheezing laugh. Reynauld flinched. Their skin was completely crusted with blood.

“You hear that?” The voice was barely above a whisper, but in the stunned silence it carried all the same. No one else could summon such mockery under the circumstances except for Quièvremont. “The first thing he says! _Where’s Dismas? Where’s Dismas?_ _”_

Dismas craned his neck up. He was on his knees, counterbalanced by Mortmain. The fine fur of his coat was a matted mess. In his lap was his haversack, cradled tightly. His stare burned scarlet, irises embered in a scintillated ruby gleam. As soon as their eyes met and Reynauld saw the colour, the smears across his face and his stained smile heavy with grief, he knew the curse had finally found him.

He took a deep breath and smiled back.

“Poor babe,” rasped Mortmain. She tried to sit upright, and trembled with the effort. In the end, Dismas was almost horizontal against her back, and she was vertical enough to laugh as well.

Reynauld baulked at the mandibles on Mortmain’s face. Barristan also lifted his head, and there was a bulbous growth underneath his chin, a swollen red pouch. Reynauld didn’t want to know what Quièvremont looked like. The film of blood coating him was gruesome enough. Pale and gaunt, eyes in vivid red, it was a small comfort Dismas wasn’t as insectile as the others.

Boudicca chuckled, shifting her weight to her other foot as she leant on her glaive. Bigby chuffed along with her. Perhaps it was less shocking for them, as their encampments on the edge of the Hamlet received all manner of abominations and outsiders.

Baldwin hummed. “I believe they’re hysterical,” he remarked.

“They’re docile enough,” said Boudicca cheerily. “C’mon, you layabouts. Back to the Hamlet with ye.”

“The scouting post would be better,” said Baldwin at the same time Reynauld said, “No, I’ll fetch Paracelsus.”

Their glares met. Boudicca ignored them as she signalled to Bigby, and the two of them edged towards the four mercenaries as though they were rescuing pit dogs too feral to know friend from foe.

“This is unwise,” said Baldwin, as the party twitched in response to Boudicca’s proximity. All of their eyes were on her with such intensity, Reynauld hesitated to sheathe his weapons.

But Boudicca gripped her glaive in one hand, and sent a flat look to Baldwin. “They en’t gonna make it to the Hamlet by themselves. Did ye want them to die out here instead?”

She swooped Quièvremont up from Barristan’s side. There was a retching noise, but Quièvremont was limp under her arm. She grinned at Reynauld.

“Ye can handle yer man, eh?”

Reynauld put away his weapons at that and went forwards. Dismas watched him with tired eyes.

“I could have the plague,” he said hoarsely.

Reynauld held out his hand. Dismas’ gaze lingered on it. His lips parted. But when was all he did, Reynauld bent down to hoist him up.

“Better than the runs,” he said.

Dismas snorted, now slumped in Reynauld’s arms. “There’s still time for me to shit on your trousers, love.”

“A fine present indeed. I would expect no less after all I’ve done for you.”

“Perhaps you’ll be more happier to see the other present in my bag.” He patted it. Reynauld noticed the clasp was broken and the bottom was soaked. “You, or Para. She’s gonna be thrilled.”

Getting a good hold on Dismas’ weight, he started off towards the Hamlet, letting Bigby take up Barristan and Baldwin carry Mortmain. Boudicca was already striding ahead, chatting to Quièvremont.

Though still pounding, Reynauld’s heart eased with the weight of Dismas in his arms. He was alive and sane, praise to the Light.

“You defeated the Baron?” asked Reynauld, hardly daring to hope. There were some shadows standing on the hills where the outsiders’ camps were, likely curious after Baldwin, Boudicca, and Bigby’s disappearance. A few people stood at the mouth to the Hamlet. The contrast of light and dark robes suggested they were Junia and Paracelsus.

Dismas followed his gaze and made an enthused noise. “We do have a reception after all. Lucky us.” He reached up with one hand, and Reynauld saw how it trembled so violently as Dismas licked his lips and rubbed his cheek. “As for the Baron, it won’t be plaguing the Courtyard any longer. Tore its tongue out and everything. It got a good bite in, so you can have your fun looking at the scars later.” He winked, and Reynauld huffed, amused despite himself.

“I will be most thorough,” he promised, and Dismas smiled, his hand finding Reynauld’s.

“Aye,” he said with a sigh, and closed his eyes, “we defeated the Baron.”

Reynauld let him doze as they neared the Hamlet, although Dismas’ shaking hands didn’t abate. When he next opened his eyes to Junia and Paracelsus, he gave them a tight nod, and Reynauld realised he must have been controlling himself the entire time.

“Gallant as always, Rey,” said Paracelsus, holding up a pair of forceps. Junia was casting blessings over Quièvremont to sustain him before he was transported to the quarantine. “You look like shit, Dismas. Did you get bitten?”

Dismas groaned. “By the Baron itself. But its mouth was useful in other ways.”

Reynauld didn’t need to see Paracelsus’ eyes to predict the excitement in them — not when she was snipping impatiently with her forceps.

“The tongue!” she said, looking him over. “You got it? Is it in here?”

Dismas relinquished his haversack with a grunt, and Paracelsus fished inside with her forceps until she pulled out a slimy, black tongue, the tip solid and hollow. Reynauld rubbed his thumb over Dismas’ hand in sympathy.

Whilst Paracelsus cooed and crooned over the tongue, Junia finished her chants and walked over to them. She took in Dismas carried in Reynauld’s arms with a pitying expression.

“Oh no,” she said softly.

Dismas snorted. “Hey Juni. Any holy words for me?”

She reached out and Dismas slipped his hand from underneath Reynauld’s to take hers. “Only a prayer of thanks that you have returned to us. I only wish you had been spared the Crimson Curse.”

Off to the side now, Paracelsus said idly, “I wouldn’t worry about it. With this sample, we should be able to cure the curse in all its stages of infection. Did you drink any human blood, Dismas? Out of professional curiosity.”

“I’ve bitten my tongue a fair few times. Does that count?” Paracelsus hummed thoughtfully, and Dismas continued, “Am I off to quarantine, then? To the house of mozzies?”

Reynauld glanced over to where Boudicca had slung Quièvremont over her shoulder due to his wriggling and was walking towards the quarantine barracks. Baldwin and Mortmain had just caught up, and Junia’s attention was seized by the full-body tremors wracking Mortmain and her rattling gasps as she was bent double. She hurried over to attend to her sister. Bigby and Barristan were still on the road, taking the path one step at a time.

Before Paracelsus could pass her judgement, Reynauld stepped towards her and said, “Dismas doesn’t need to be in quarantine, does he?”

Paracelsus turned her head towards him. “Of course he does,” she said blankly. Dismas also stared at him as though he’d just recommended they put a torch in a Shambler’s altar.

“I’m infected, love,” he said. “Can’t go around willy-nilly, can I? That’d defeat the whole object.”

“Well,” said Reynauld, “you do not need to quarantine if you are not infected, is that not so?” He was careful not to look at the others as he leant forwards. “Curing Dismas of the curse would mean avoiding quarantine.”

“Hang on now,” started Dismas angrily, “don’t you go around deciding what’s best for me. Pont’s been a mosquito for weeks now. He was the first of us to be infected! He of all people should be cured first. And then there’s Amani: the poor girl is already afraid of snakes, and now she has to live with two massive fangs in her mouth—!”

Paracelsus, the point of her beak aimed at Reynauld, finally nodded. Relief washed over him. “All right.”

“Mortmain wanted a bath, it’s all she — beg your pardon?” Dismas gripped Reynauld’s arm.

Paracelsus sealed the tongue back into his haversack and shouldered it. With her forceps, she gestured to Dismas. “You’re in the early stages of the curse. Your treatment should be purely fluid, whilst Pont, Amani, even Mortmain it seems, will have to undergo surgery to remove their malignant organs and extremities.”

“What if this tongue doesn’t create anything?” argued Dismas, looking back and forth between Paracelsus and Reynauld. “What if you give me something that makes it worse?”

“You’re already a stinking highwayman with a love for the lyrical. Anything from here will be an improvement.”

“That’s it, I’m taking myself to the quarantine.” He wrestled against Reynauld’s hold. “Let me down, you fool.”

“He has a point, Paracelsus,” said Reynauld urgently, lowering Dismas’ legs so he could find his balance on the ground. When Dismas wobbled, he placed a hand on his lower back.

Paracelsus laughed and started to walk. “He’s going to be fine and you know it. Come now, Dismas. Your friends won’t begrudge you if you’re the first to be cured.”

Dismas’ mouth opened in protest, but then he looked towards Mortmain and Barristan, who had been following the conversation with an unnerving focus. Mortmain chittered, which startled Reynauld but seemed to signal a form of acceptance, judging by Dismas’ slump of defeat. Barristan raised his fist.

“You fought honourably against the Baron, my friend,” he croaked. The pouch underneath his chin undulated with his words. “Its defeat was your work. Tactics, remember?”

“Dumb luck, it felt like,” said Dismas with a half-hearted grumble. At Reynauld’s inquisitive look, he waved a hand. “The story can wait. Apparently, I have a curing to undergo.”

“You’ll make a finer jerky than the Swine Prince,” said Paracelsus. She bounced along the path towards the sanitarium. “Get it? Curing, jerky, pork meat?”

“Light above, Para. Please leave the love of the lyrical to me and Sarmenti.” He hummed, low and pained, as he took a few steps forwards. His hand trailed away from Reynauld, and he turned back in surprise. “What’s that you have there, Rey?” A true smile, amazed and amused in equal measure, lit up his face. “I’ll be damned. You taking up firearms? ”

Reynauld flushed and went to unbuckle the dirk and the flintlock pistol. “Ah, no. Thought you would appreciate an upgrade from—” He gestured to Dismas’ belt. With his coat thrown open, he saw there was no pistol in the holster. He frowned, although Dismas caught his confusion and waved his hand again. Deciding to wait for an explanation later, he met Dismas’ eyes and smirked. “Besides, a Baron-killer deserves worthy weapons, no?”

Creased with mirth, he decided the red eyes weren’t so startling. Dismas huffed and turned away, his hand reflexively going to pull up his neckerchief.

“Sure. It’s…real sweet. Thank you, Rey. Maybe Audrey can help me pick out a new coat to complete the set.” He cleared his throat. “You coming with?”

“To the sanitarium, yes, but the heir must be notified of your success. Then I’ll put these inside the shop before I damage them.”

As they walked to the sanitarium, his attention lingered to Baldwin, Junia, and Mortmain just behind them. The three of them were in deep discussion, and as much as Reynauld wanted to drop back to join in, Mortmain seemed overwhelmed enough with Baldwin and Junia fretting over her.

If Paracelsus was right and the cure she developed couldn’t control the growths that emerged amongst the infected, then there would be weeks of surgery ahead. Pont’s insectile wings would be challenge enough, although even if his back did fully heal, he would likely set it to rights with his flagellation.

Reynauld hoped the surgery on Amani and Mortmain wouldn’t damage their palates permanently. Mortmain struggled to smell as it was. Perhaps Bigby, whose teeth were sharp and uneven and shed periodically to make way for new sets, could help teach them to eat their food.

The Hamlet would recover. Its people would recover. The Baron and the bloodsuckers _could_ be quelled, and it was Dismas himself who had proved that. His Dismas, highwayman and Courtyard conqueror. The pistol and dirk weren’t enough to convey his pride, his gratitude.

When he met Dismas’ eyes before he was admitted into the sanitarium, Dismas’ grin suggested he knew what was on his mind.

“See you on the other side, Rey,” he said wryly. “Don’t bake too many pies for me.”

“Just a big one, then,” teased Reynauld. “Take care. I love you.”

“Love you too. Can’t wait to wash the taste of blood out of my mouth — yes, Para, I’m coming, I’m coming, Rey was distracting me…”

Dismas pointedly rolled his eyes and Reynauld laughed, before he was urged into the sanitarium and the doors were closed. He waited for a moment, in case there was trouble or Dismas was kicked out or Paracelsus changed her mind.

But perhaps it was his need to relish the moment, the buoyant relief that loosened all the stress that had been haranguing him ever since Dismas had first set foot in the Courtyard, that made him pause. He enjoyed the smile still on his lips.

Because even though Mortmain was escorted into the quarantine after Quièvremont, and Bigby followed after, there was a clarity in the air: a purpose restored, a peace renewed.

Reynauld slapped his neck. But it was only pollen, swept in from the nearby fields.

* * *

Reynauld clasped his hands behind his back. Dismas tucked his thumbs into the hems of his new coat’s pockets. The summer humidity glistened on their brows.

The heir sighed and slid a piece of parchment across her desk. The pointed crest, painted in leering crimson, caught the light from the top of the parchment. Dismas and Reynauld met each other’s eyes before they looked to the heir.

“A feast for all — the finest culinary comestibles served to the intrepid warriors who acquainted with the Baron. The Courtyard opens its gates for a carousal of revelry and indulgence to the four soldiers under the employ of Lady Darkest, who so impressed the Courtyard and its courtiers upon their last entry. The Viscount hereby presents his compliments and highest consideration to the Lady Darkest in this invitation to the Courtyard.”

The heir finished reading the parchment, upside down though it was, and Dismas leant forwards to get a better look, an almost impressed pout pulling down his mouth. Reynauld scowled.

“Who is this Viscount to send an invite like this?” he said through gritted teeth.

Dismas laughed and nudged him. “Intrepid warrior. Now that’s a title and a half. They should put _that_ on my wanted posters in the cities.”

“A bloodsucker with some esteem amongst the others, apparently. The invite is quite explicit,” said the heir tentatively, “that the original four party members who went into the Courtyard should return.” She looked at Reynauld as she said this. After all, the three of them knew who would have the greatest grievance against this.

Dismas rested his hand on the pommel of his new dirk. “We’ve played their games once. We can do it again.”

“We played their games because we thought we’d won,” Reynauld shot back.

Dismas gazed coolly at him, scarlet though his stare was when the light slanted just so. “I think we all knew they weren’t over yet. The bloodsuckers have been spotted about. It was only a matter of time. What’s _your_ decision?” he said to the heir.

The heir thumbed her signet ring, glaring at the crest on the parchment. “It’s a provocation we cannot ignore. Though we managed to cure everyone with the Baron’s tissue, I cannot allow the Hamlet’s people to come under such a threat again.” She rapped her fingers against the desk with a note of finality. “Let’s see how the Viscount likes his revenge, then.”

“Served cold, probably,” said Dismas, and plucked the invitation from the desk.


End file.
